French state media reports that the country’s parliament is set to send two delegations on visits to Taiwan this month.
The trips look a lot like a “balancing act” response to remarks by president Emmanuel Macron, who returned from a friendly visit with Chinese premier Xi Jinping last week and Les Echos last week in an interview that Europe should take its own positions on the Beijing/Taipei relationship instead of acting as mere “followers” to the US and its South China Sea brinksmanship. Macron continues to stand by that position, saying “being an ally does not mean being a vassal,” while noting that European policy on the issues involved “has not changed.”
MP Éric Bothorel, who supports a Senate-passed bill favoring Taiwanese participation in international organizations (usually precluded due to opposition from Beijing), leads the first delegation arriving today, intends to discuss semiconductors, as well as “culture and talent cultivation,” with his Taiwanese counterparts.
On April 24, Alain Richard, chair of the French Senate’s Taiwan Friendship Group, will lead a second delegation to the island nation. As the delegation was announced by Taiwanese Minister of Foreign Affairs Joseph Wu in a Bloomberg interview, that visit seems likely to focus more on French policy vis a vis the two countries’ perpetual cross-strait staring contest, with the intention of offering the Taiwanese regime some assurances that France (or even all of Europe) isn’t about to introduce significant policy changes.
So France tries to sit on both sides of the fence. Forked tongue devils they are.
Balancing act, sure.
It is either Macron being Macron — or the sectarian nature of European politics is showing its displeasure.
Macron sold like 200 Airbus and like 50 helicopters as well signed a bunch of other commercial deals with China. It’s mission accomplished for him apparently.